International Conference on Health Policy Statistics (ICHPS) 2018 Specific Aims The 12th International Conference on Health Policy Statistics (ICHPS), under the timely theme, ?Health <-> Statistical Science <-> Care, Policy, Outcomes?, focuses on the interactive relationship between health services research and innovative statistical methodology. It falls within the category of ?Research Design and Methodology? in the AHRQ program announcement. The primary sponsor is the Section on Health Policy Statistics of the American Statistical Association (ASA). The 12th ICHPS will be held January 10 to 12, 2018 in Charleston, South Carolina. Details for the last ICHPS conducted in 2015 attended by 246 participants, are available online at: http://www.amstat.org/meetings/ichps/2015/index.cfm. The overarching aim of ICHPS is to create an educational and research forum for statisticians, econometricians, and other research methodologists working on cutting-edge and innovative approaches to exchange and to build upon ideas, and to foster the tradition of linking methodologists with policymakers and other stakeholders in the health services research and health policy arenas to add focus and perspective to the development of new methodological tools. Additional aims of ICHPS 2018 are to increase participation by students and junior investigators, as well as to increase local engagement. The technical program for the upcoming ICHPS will examine a broad range of topics that fit very well with the goals of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), consistent with previous ICHPS conferences supported by AHRQ. The invited sessions will be useful to promote improvements in the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care by developing, debating and disseminating state-of-the-art research methods. In line with ASA's increasing efforts to engage policy-makers and other stakeholders in health policy, ICHPS 2018 will focus on data-centric statistical methodology related to health services research, and health policy issues of national and international importance. The invited program includes invited sessions, workshops, contributed talks and posters, in addition to a keynote and a plenary speaker. The confirmed keynote speaker is national expert Dr. Robert Califf, Professor of Medicine at Duke University and former Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. The confirmed plenary speaker is Dr. Suchi Saria, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, Johns Hopkins University, a machine learning expert working on the use of data-driven technology to improve healthcare. Sessions will cover key methodological areas including: causal inference, health disparities research, propensity scores, analysis of complex survey data, heterogeneous treatment effects and individualized treatments, longitudinal modeling, meta-analysis and evidence synthesis, novel trial designs, real-world data, and patient-reported outcomes. Most importantly, the ICHPS program is focused on addressing key health care policy research priorities. Applied topics that have been focal points at recent ICHPS meetings on comparative effectiveness research include examining evidence-based care, patient-reported outcomes analyses, and personalized medicine. The program will also include roundtable discussions to provide research training and career development for new and current health policy and health services researchers in methods, resources and applications at the forefront of health policy research. Plans for dissemination include pursuing a special issue in Springer's, Health Services and Outcomes Research Methodology for conference proceedings, as was done for 2015 ICHPS (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10742-016-0165-5). In addition, we will publish articles on emerging topics and themes, and interviews with award winners in magazines and social media.